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An increase in the room tax from 7% to 8% would allow the Brookfield Convention & Visitors Bureau to more than double its budget, from $241,600 this year to $493,600 in 2000.

The recommendation for a higher room tax comes on the heels of an alarming presentation to the committee last month by hospitality industry consultant Gregory R. Hanis. Brookfield's hotel market is in danger of becoming saturated and depressed as competing hotels open in the city and communities nearby, Hanis said.

But Patti Wallner, executive director of the bureau, said the uncertain outlook for the hotel market was only part of the reason the committee backed a full 1% room-tax increase instead of the half-percent rise it had previously considered.

"It goes far beyond just a focus on the hotels," Wallner said. "Our mission has evolved to be one which is truly economic development of the Brookfield area. And although we specifically promote the hotels, we will also be more specifically promoting the restaurants, the shopping centers, the services of the Brookfield area, and creating what we consider a destination in the mind of the traveling public."

Wallner said the bureau also plans to work with local educators to promote careers in the hospitality industry.

The Convention & Visitors Bureau is funded entirely by a portion of the room tax levied by the City and the Town of Brookfield. Under state law, at least 70% of any increase in a hotel room tax must go toward tourism promotion.

The bureau represents 13 hotels, eight of them in the city and five in the town.

Any comprehensive tax increase still must be approved later this month by the Common Council.

On Wednesday night, the Brookfield Town Board approved the 1% increase in the room tax effective Jan. 1.

In addition to helping the bureau, the tax increase would allow the city's Economic Development Committee, which receives a small cut of the room tax, to nearly double its revenue next year. This year, the committee expects to receive $86,234 through the tax. In 2000, it would generate an estimated $163,844.

That money would go toward fostering economic development and attracting new businesses to Brookfield, said Kathleen Cady Schilling, the city's economic development coordinator.

Wallner said the extra funding for the bureau would enable it to take on several new initiatives. Among them:

• The hiring of a sales representative to work on attracting small conventions and meetings of companies and state associations to Brookfield. Wallner said the Sheraton Milwaukee-Brookfield hotel can handle groups as large as 500, while the Wyndham Garden Hotel and Embassy Suites Hotel can accommodate conventions of about about 150 people.
• Increased advertising aimed at potential tourists from the Minneapolis-St. Paul area.
• "Get-away weekend" packaging of hotel rooms and tickets to Milwaukee professional sports events or nature areas in Milwaukee and Waukesha counties.
• The hiring of a consultant to launch new media campaigns and help determine new markets to target.

The bureau also may be facing a significant rent increase at its headquarters and visitors center adjacent to the Old Toll Road Village building at 16460 W. Blue Mound Road. The bureau moved into the building in summer 1998 as the subtenant of

Bruegger's Bagel Bakery, paying $900 a month in rent. Bruegger's moved out in August, Wallner said, leaving the rest of the building unoccupied.

If the bureau were to assume full rent for the building, it would amount to about $2,600 a month.

"We don't want to move," Wallner said. "If someone else would come in and say we want the whole building, we'd say we would prefer to have first dibs on it. The visitors center location has been way beyond our imagination in terms of the number of visitors that we are generating though here."

Through September of this year, 2,450 people had visited the bureau's visitors center, Wallner said. Previously, when the bureau was in an office building off Blue Mound Road, is drew an average of six walk-in visitors per month, she said.